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R&A chief executive Martin Slumbers admits he will pleased when this year\u2019s Open Championship at Royal Portrush is over after revealing the \u201csignificant concern\u201d being caused by Brexit.<\/p>\nR&A chief executive Martin Slumbers admits he will pleased when this year\u2019s Open Championship at Royal Portrush is over after revealing the \u201csignificant concern\u201d being caused by Brexit.<\/p>\n
Portrush will stage the Open for the first time since 1951 from July 18-21 and tickets for the championship days at the Northern Irish venue have already sold out.<\/p>\n
However, that decision was announced in October 2015, eight months before the referendum to leave the European Union, and the continuing uncertainty surrounding Brexit \u2013 and in particular the backstop to retain an open border on the island of Ireland \u2013 is causing headaches for golf\u2019s governing body.<\/p>\n
\u201cLike every business, and I think about the Open as such, the lack of certainty about the rules, the law in which we are operating under post-March 29th has caused us significant concern,\u201d Slumbers said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn hindsight would I be wanting to do Portrush in the year that we would be potentially leaving the European Union without a deal? No.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe as a management team have spent a lot of time looking at contingencies and what we need to do. The future of the border is the number one concern. We have over 2000 containers (some from as far afield as the Middle East) to get across the Irish Sea and we start building on April 2.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have engagement with ministers and Parliament but the concern is all around certainty. If you know the rules you\u2019re playing by then you can play, you optimize what you\u2019ve got.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe problem is we don\u2019t know whether to reschedule to bring all our containers in through Dublin, whether to move them through Belfast, whether to ship them out of the UK now.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt doesn\u2019t threaten the staging, we will make it happen. It\u2019s just more complex than we anticipated. For the insiders it\u2019s a bit harder but for everyone outside it won\u2019t impact at all, they won\u2019t notice.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are fully sold out for the championship days and 70 percent of the spectators are Irish. I think it will be very noisy and pretty exciting, especially if a few Irish players start to really perform.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brexit is not the only cause for concern for the championship organizers, with Portrush having built two new holes to accommodate the tented village on what used to be the 17th and 18th on the Dunluce links.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomeone said to me when I was out for the Latin American amateur championship \u2018You must be looking forward to Portrush\u2019 and I said well actually I\u2019ll be quite pleased when it\u2019s over,\u201d Slumbers added.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve never done an Open where we have to get all our stuff across the sea, we\u2019ve never done an Open in Portrush, but the biggest thing is we\u2019ve got a golf course that off the Open tees nobody has played with a card in their hand.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo course set up, which is at the end of the day is my number one concern and responsibility, is with a complete blank canvas. We\u2019ll be there a lot on the golf course working out how we think they\u2019re going to play it and we\u2019ve had a few Tour caddies there helping talk through how they think their players will play.\u201d<\/p>\n